


The Spider and Her Butterfly

by sithcommando236



Series: The Spider and Her Butterfly [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Aren't these two great together?, F/F, Fluff and Smut, Lesbian Sex, Mental Anguish, Smut is in chapter 6, The first part of a 3-part series, This is mainly the romance origin part, Widowtracer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-28
Updated: 2016-07-16
Packaged: 2018-07-18 21:04:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 19,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7330597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sithcommando236/pseuds/sithcommando236
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lena knew Amelie Lacroix as the beautiful and kind woman married to Gerard.  She knew Talon had kidnapped Amelie after Gerard was found murdered in the couple's home, and Lena searched far and wide for the abducted woman.  It wasn't until that fateful rooftop fight at King's Row that she realized that Talon's new assassin, codenamed Widowmaker, and the woman Lena had been searching for were one and the same. </p><p>Widowmaker had no true memories, just loose sensations and fractured images.  Seeing Lena on that rooftop made her feel... something.  Why?  There's only one way to find out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Things Remembered, Things Forgotten

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone! I've written a lot of creative stories for my own use over the years, as well as read a LOT of other people's fanfictions. I decided to try my hand at it, too, so I hope you like my first-ever uploaded fanfic! Comments and kudos are apreciated, thanks!
> 
> P.S. Again, this is my first time uploading a work, so I'd really appreciate commentors telling me anything that seems off about the story (grammar, flow, if people seem OOC, etc.) - you're the target audience, and my work is here to please you. Thanks and enjoy! ;D

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Takes place after the "Alive" trailer; Lena thinks upon what happened at King's Row and about the woman she knew as Amelie Lacroix.

_Currently, Tracer’s quarters_

She was dreaming.  Or maybe having a vivid experience of a memory was a better way to describe it, because the worst part of this particular dream was the fact that it had actually happened. 

_Lena looked on in horror from her vantage point on a nearby building’s roof as shouts of fear, anger, and – most of all – anguish exploded from the crowd of humans and Omnics that had gathered for the speech to be given by the Omnic Tekhartha Mondatta, founder of the Shambali Monastery for Omnics._

_Lena could see from her vantage point that Mondatta lay half-in and half-out of the door to his armored car, and there was an enormous bullet hole in his chassis, having shattered most of the surrounding circuitry and hardware, causing mechanical liquids to seep from his insides and stain his Shambali robe.  He was quite possibly the greatest advocate for peace between humans and Omnics.  And now he was dead._

_She registered this in seconds, then began to shout, “No! No no NO!”_

_The she whirled on the one responsible, the Talon assassin called Widowmaker.  Lena charged the taller woman and slammed into her, managing to knock the purple assassin down, Lena straddling her thighs and pinning her to the edge of the rooftop._

_She gulped back tears as she shouted, “Why?!  Why would you do this?”_

_Widowmaker merely chuckled a condescending yet, somehow_ familiar _chuckle._

_Lena knew that chuckle – and come to think of it, she knew that face well…but…but it couldn’t be.  But it was._

_And it was in that moment that time had seemed to stop, and Lena’s world came crashing down around her for the second time that night.  This wasn’t just some expert assassin/super-hot femme fatale working for Talon; it was Amélie Lacroix, widow of the late Gérard Lacroix; long-thought lost or stolen and brainwashed by Talon (which Lena’s realization had just confirmed)._

_Lena stared at the woman in shock, unable understand why the ray of sunshine that had been Amélie was now responsible for the assassinations of important people all over the globe.  The woman’s physical alterations were just as disturbing to Lena._

_Then her breath had hitched as Widowmaker leaned in close with an obviously evil smirk and whispered, “Adieu, chérie,” and then grabbed Lena and swung them off of the edge of the building and onto a rooftop below, where Widowmaker slammed Lena into a brick wall and shorted out her chronal accelerator._

_Lena had collapsed to the ground and held herself, stunned from the blow to her accelerator as Widowmaker grappled herself up into the waiting Talon transport and made her escape._

_Lena had curled into the fetal position and frantically keyed her earpiece into the old radio channel used by Overwatch agents before the organization’s unceremonious shutdown, and contacted Winston._

_“Winston, are ya there?! Please, Winston, please_ answer _!”_

_A few tense seconds passed by with no response from the other end of the connection, and Lena began to think to herself that this rooftop would be where she would finally get sucked back into the accursed limbo outside of solid time, trapped as a ghost dispersed across the time stream._

_Then a deep rumbling voice sounded in her ear and replied in a frantic tone, “-ena?!  What’s wrong? Is it your accelerator?”  Winston knew it was one of the only reasons that the usually bubbly Brit would sound so distraught._

_She took a moment and sighed in relief, then said, “I had a run-in with Widowmaker.  She damaged the accelerator and I need immediate evac.  I’m on a rooftop in King’s Row.”_

_Winston had replied in a serious voice, “Okay, locked onto your location.  Hold tight, Angela and I are on our way.  We’ll be there in twenty minutes; we’re taking the fastest transport we still have.”_

_Those had been the longest twenty minutes of her life.  She stayed in the fetal position she had curled into for fear of jostling her already-damaged chronal accelerator, and shut her eyes as memories of a woman she had thought was gone began to resurface, stabbing at her heart with the realization that Amélie was indeed gone, and her mind had been replaced with that of the cold, unfeeling Widowmaker._

_Lena remembered all of their time together, everything that they had shared before Amélie had been abducted by Talon.  And behind those memories, she saw those piercing almond-gold eyes staring back at her._

_Her breathing had become much too rapid, completely out of her control.  Unable to steady herself, Lena had passed out around the fifteen-minute mark as her mind had faded into blackness._

 

Lena shot up in her bed, the blanket pooling in her lap as she gasped for breath and blearily looked around her darkened room to regain some sense of her surroundings.  She reached over to her bedside lamp and flicked it on, illuminating the room.

She looked around again, and the rest slowly came back to her.  She was in her quarters at one of the few recently-reactivated secret Overwatch facilities; this one located in Gibraltar.

Her breathing began to slow down to a normal rate, and it was then that she realized her tank top was soaked in cold sweat.  It felt like the damn thing was squeezing the life out of her, and she needed to escape.  She threw the blanket off of her legs and sighed as cool air rolled over her bare, much-too-warm legs.  Then she loosened the straps on her stripped-down accelerator and pulled her damp tank top over her head, which served to further tousle her wild spiky hair.

Finally relieved of the suffocating garments and clad in only her accelerator and plaid boxers, Lena relaxed her ramrod straight back and leaned back onto her elbows.  She glanced at the clock that sat on her small nightstand and groaned when she saw that it read in soft blue holographically-projected numbers: 3:08 a.m. 

She let out another frustrated sigh and laid down on her mostly bare back, opting to leave the lamp on.  She stared resignedly at a spot on the ceiling of her quarters as she thought to herself, _looks like it’s gonna be another sleepless night._

She had only gone to bed a couple of hours ago, when Angela had finally cleared her as physically healthy and Winston had begun repairs on the accelerator’s components.  Currently, Lena wore the base of her accelerator; it was what kept her anchored in the present and thankfully hadn’t been damaged.  It was the components that allowed Lena to blink forward through and rewind time that had been damaged, and it was those components that Winston was fixing, reinforcing, and had promised to make some upgrades to.

Then Lena thought back to her dream/vivid memory, and thought about the woman who was at the center of recent events and had caused her to need the repairs in the first place. 

Upon waking up in the base’s medical bay, Lena had explained everything that had happened to Winston and Angela, including her realization that Widowmaker was really Amélie Lacroix.  Her friends had been shocked, and then deeply saddened when they realized the implications of what must have happened to Amélie to turn her into a Talon assassin.

Lena remembered the beautiful Frenchwoman from before the abduction.  They had been introduced years ago, when Lena was barely out of her teens and had just gotten over the accident with the Slipstream.  It had been just after Gérard was appointed head of the Overwatch taskforce dedicated to rooting out and destroying the underground terrorist organization, Talon.  Due to the fact that he was almost always constantly on missions and only had time to recuperate at the Overwatch base that had been in Annecy, France, he had bought a house there so that he could be with his wife during the rare times when he was off-mission.

Amélie was often onsite and had been introduced to all of the agents by Gérard.  The Annecy base had been one of the main European headquarters, so Lena had frequented it.  When she had met Amélie, it took all of Lena’s willpower to control her blush when the striking woman that was Gérard’s wife kissed her on either cheek and said ‘ _Bonjour, jeune fille douce_ ’ in a sweet tone and a beautiful voice that made Lena’s stomach flip.

Lena had volunteered to give her a tour of the facility and, in the process, they had really hit it off.  After their initial meeting (and whenever Lena had some downtime), the two women would go out for a companionable day together.  They usually talked about various topics over coffee at a local café and walked around one of the local parks.

Lena had come to terms with the fact that she was deeply attracted to Gérard’s wife but, because Lena was an honorable person and would never partake in such a scandalous relationship, stuck to her usual flirtations but never went farther than that.  The same could be said of Amélie, who never admitted to it, but often reciprocated Lena’s flirtations.  They never acted on it, but still, it was there.

Lena remembered that whenever they were around each other, Lena’s palms would become clammy and her stomach would fill with butterflies.  She also remembered what she had liked most about her close friend:  the fact that Amélie was always a ray of sunshine who provided moral support for the agents that were fighting the good fight (she had always been a supporter of Overwatch’s goals); the fact that sometimes she would bake cookies for the agents (Lena _really_ liked cookies); and the fact that Amélie would sneak Lena a heart-shaped cookie with a wink, making the younger girl blush furiously.

All in all, good memories.

And then, one day, Talon had enacted a plan so heinous it made Lena shake with the fury she felt for the disgusting organization.  After failing time and again to kill Gérard, they had instead changed tactics, targeting Amélie.  The cowards didn’t target her for assassination though; no, what they did with her was much, much worse. 

They instead had abducted her.  Gérard was blindsided with grief and spent weeks searching for his missing wife.  He eventually found her, bruised and bloodied but alive, in an abandoned Talon base.  Amélie was brought back to the Annecy HQ where she was thoroughly checked out by Angela, both physically and mentally.  After she was treated for her wounds and seemed to be only shaken but still mentally sound, she had been cleared to go home with Gérard to finish her recovery.  Two weeks later, Gérard was found murdered in his home and Amélie was gone.  Everyone knew the most likely culprit of the murder, but no one wanted to accept the fact that Amélie had probably been brainwashed by Talon and turned into a sleeper agent.

And so Lena had volunteered to search for her, both to take her home again and to, hopefully, clear the woman’s name and prove her innocence.  And if she had indeed been irredeemably brainwashed into a Talon drone, Lena would bring her to justice, whatever that entailed.  Lena had searched for months, and yet she had found nothing.

In the meantime, there was a spate of assassinations all around the globe, with the victims spanning from the leaders of various governmental factions, human and Omnic diplomats and cultural leaders, and even members of other terrorist organizations and rivals to Talon.  Eventually, Overwatch was made aware of an assassin codenamed Widowmaker.

One of Overwatch’s founding members, Ana Amari, was tasked with providing Strike-Commander Morrison and a team of agents cover on a mission to evac a team of scientists with knowledge that could not under any circumstances fall into Talon's hands.  Ana was considered one of – if not _the_ – best snipers in the world.  The scientists were evacuated, but not before a sniper assumed to be Widowmaker killed multiple Overwatch agents, including Ana.  Lena had been deeply saddened by the loss of Ana, but it had of course hit Ana’s daughter, Fareeha the hardest.  She had retreated from Overwatch and gone back to Cairo to focus on securing her home from the emerging threats there.

Then the accusations had started.  Nations began to blame much of the destruction around the world (committed by both Talon and other groups) on Overwatch, and called for its immediate shutdown.  The destruction of the Overwatch base in Switzerland was the final straw.  A meeting of the United Nations had resulted in the agreement that the organization did more harm than good, and the PETRAS Act had been signed into law, declaring the organization illegal.  Overwatch was shut down, and many of its agents were either arrested or went into hiding.  Some started families and enjoyed a normal life; others became mercenaries for hire; and then there were those like Lena, Winston, and Angela, and others who still did what good they could, helping those in need.

Lena remembered her first encounter with Widowmaker when she and Winston had stopped her and Reaper from stealing Doomfist’s gauntlet at the museum.  Lena hadn’t realized who the assassin was then.

And then last night had happened.  She failed to stop the assassination, and had come away with the disturbing realization of Widowmaker’s identity.

Lena’s own question rang around in her head, still waiting for the other woman’s answer; _‘Why?!  Why would you do this?’_

Then another question occurred to Lena:  _Why didn’t she just kill me?_

The implications of that question were too hopeful for Lena to put much stock into, yet she still managed to close her eyes and fall back asleep with a small smile on her lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading :D


	2. Exercising in the Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena likes to workout in the dark, but what she doesn't realize is that the dark is the perfect place to become a spider's prey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, comments and kudos are always appreciated! Thanks and enjoy!

_A week later, Watchpoint: Gibraltar_

 

Winston, Overwatch’s resident peanut butter and banana-loving gorilla scientist (who absolutely  _hated_ when agents (McCree) made jokes about Winston being the herald of the end-times depicted in the  _Planet of the Apes_  franchise) had finished repairing and upgrading the components to Lena’s chronal accelerator.  After he had explained the various tune-ups and alterations, Lena had thanked him and retreated back to her quarters.

She had been plagued with thoughts of Amélie and what she had become during Lena’s week of recovery at the base.  Lena hoped she’d get a mission soon that would lead to her crossing paths with the assassin; maybe Lena would be able to talk to her, get some answers or maybe even switch sides!  _Okay, not that last one, maybe_ , she thought to herself, _but it’s still worth a try, yeah?_  

But as she continued to think about everything Amélie had done during her time as Widowmaker, Lena’s heart began to sink. 

She needed time to sort out her thoughts; to wade through the fog of mixed feelings and unhappy truths.  It was late, but she wasn’t tired, so she decided to pay a visit to the base’s rec room; punching a sand-bag and practicing her kick-boxing moves would definitely help her work out some stress and straighten out her mind. 

The base was mostly empty at this time of night; the other agents were either out on missions of their own or at their respective places of residence.  Winston had fallen asleep in his lab while writing a strongly-worded anonymous letter to whoever was responsible for the abomination that was  _Planet of the Apes: Rise of the Omnic-Zombie Apes_ , and Angela had gone to help out a local hospital that was currently understaffed. 

Lena went into the locker room attached to the rec room and opened her locker, changing out of her trademark orange leggings and worn brown RAF flight jacket and into a black sports bra and simple black exercise leggings.  She also stripped down her chronal accelerator to its lightweight form.  She plugged her earbuds into the jack on the side of her accelerator (some of Winston’s modifications included a built-in radio transceiver for easy access to Overwatch’s special frequencies, as well as the ability to download Lena’s favorite songs into a small memory chip in the accelerator).  As her favorite song started to play, she went back out into the rec room and stretched, twisting this way and that and feeling her muscles pleasantly expand and contract, a couple of her vertebrae and joints giving a nice  _pop_ -ing sound. 

Then she went to the hanging sand-bag and began to go to town on it.  She surprised herself, the ferocity of her punches and kicks going beyond what was necessary for simple stressercise.  She thought on what had happened to Amélie, how she had most likely killed Gérard, how she had been turned into a stripper assassin by Talon, and how Lena would most likely never again spend time with the kind cookie-baking woman from before all of this had happened.

Lena realized with a start that she was crying and holding onto the bag for support now, rather than wailing on it as before.  It didn’t help that the current song she was listening to was filled with the gut-wrenching sounds of drawn-out emotional orchestral music – probably a song from a movie where the protagonist loses her lover to the forces of evil and has no way to get them back.  And so Lena collapsed on the ground in a heap, hunched over and crying silently to herself.  Tears mixed with sweat and ran down her face and arms as she shook.  Then the song ended and she took out her earbuds, no longer wanting to listen to overly-emotional music.  

Wiping her face with the backs of her hands, Lena slowly stood.  She had been facing away from the entrance to the rec room, so she nearly jumped out of her skin when the soft sound of someone quietly clearing their throat sounded from behind her.  Lena shrieked, jumped up from the ground, and spun around to face the person all in one move, ending up in a ridiculous karate stance.

Lena hadn’t opted to turn on the lights in the rec room, instead relying on the calming light of her chronal accelerator to see – which, in retrospect, was probably a terrible idea.  She couldn’t see past five feet in front of her, so she nervously called out in a shaky voice to the unseen person, “Hello?  Who’s there?  Winston is that you?” 

There was no answer. 

 _Okay, really not liking this right now_ , she thought to herself as new sweat started to gather on her neck and back, cold from fear this time.  She made her way to light switch and flicked it on, hoping that the noise she had heard was just a trick of her distraught mind.  It didn’t do anything.  The room was still dark.

Lena’s eyes widened, pupils dilated from serious fear, and the young Brit breathed faster as her fight or flight instincts kicked in.  She ran back to the locker room where she had left her gear, including her pistols.

She made it into the doorway and was immediately stuck fast, having slammed smack in the middle of what seemed to be…  _An_ enormous _friggin’ web?!_  She frantically thought to herself as she began to writhe and kick in an unsuccessful attempt to free herself. 

“Let me go you bugger!” she yelled at the unseen assailant.  Then something sharp pricked her neck, and the world went dark.


	3. What are these Feelings?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena wakes up in an unfamiliar place with an unlikely person at her bedside and Widow contemplates some disturbing emotions.

_An unknown amount of time later, in a place she didn’t recognize…_

Lena came to with a start.

“Oi, my bloody head,” she whined to herself.  She felt as if she had been hit by a hypertrain and it was difficult to focus on anything.  She tried opening her eyes to take in her surroundings, but the light was on in the room and only made her headache worse.  As she tried to move her hand to shield her eyes from the too-bright light, she realized with a start that she was restrained; her arms were tied above her head to some kind of posts and she was sitting on a not-too uncomfortable surface.

Panicked, she snapped her eyes open, ignoring the pain in her head.  As her surroundings came into focus, she realized a few key details: 1) She was tied to a bed big enough for only one person, unless two people were real cozy with each other, 2) She didn’t recognize the room, which was sparsely furnished except for a bookcase, a nightstand with a datapad laying on top of it, and of course the bed itself, and last but not least, 3) There was  a chair to Lena’s right, and in that chair sat the woman who was the nexus of all of Lena’s recent stress and emotional turbulence, Amélie Lacroix, a.k.a. Widowmaker.

“Finally you wake, _chérie_ ; I thought I was going to have to start slapping you to get you to wake up,” Widowmaker said as she smiled at Lena.

 _That is not a good smile_ , Lena thought to herself.  _Good smiles reach people’s eyes and make the people they smile at feel happy, too_.  Widowmaker’s smile just made Lena feel extremely uncomfortable, as if the woman was planning something unpleasant for the agent in the not-to-distant future.

“Wh…why am I here?” Lena asked her captor.  “Whacha gonna do to me?”  _How come I’m not dead yet_ , she thought to herself.

For the first time since Lena had met the new and deadly Amélie, the Frenchwoman bit her lower lip and looked off to the side, indecision clouding her eyes.  Then the woman’s face hardened, as if she had come to a decision.

Turning her head to look directly into Lena's eyes, she said, “I… do not remember much from before I became Talon’s weapon.  I remember… disjointed feelings and sensations, but not much else.  Fighting you on that rooftop however, when we came face to face…that woke something in me.  I remembered something…”

 

_A week ago, in this room_

 

Widowmaker sat up on her bed, leaning her back on the single pillow at the head of the bed, lost deep in thought.  She was thinking about that _odieux_  little British Overwatch agent that had tried to stop her from assassinating Mondatta, and how Widow had decided to merely incapacitate the girl rather than eliminate her permanently.  She couldn’t shake the feeling that she had recognized the girl from somewhere – but that was impossible, right?  Talon’s experiments had buried her memories and feelings deep down into the depths of her mind, almost completely out of her reach.  They had made it so that the only time she could feel anything – feel  _alive_ – was as a bullet spiraled its way out of the tip of her rifle and ended its journey in a target’s skull.  And yet, that insufferable girl had struck something inside of Widow, made her  _feel…_   _something_.  Something Widow couldn’t figure out. 

Widow hated not knowing things, especially when it came to almost feeling things that were just beyond her reach.  Had she known the Brit?  Had they been friends?  Had they been enemies?  Why did thinking about the agent make her heart beat faster than the usually slow pace set by the Talon experiments? 

All of these questions swirled in Widow’s mind as she pulled out her datapad from the drawer in her nightstand.  A search of the databases accessible by the public only yielded some pictures of the agent from when Overwatch had been in good graces with the world’s governments, as well as some articles about the agent’s public achievements.  All in all, not very much information, except looking at the pictures made Widow’s chest do the… the  _thing_  again.

Next, she accessed Talon’s database and scrolled through the list of known Overwatch agents.  As the names and pictures flashed by on the left-hand side of the screen, Widow felt nothing as she saw the faces:

A blonde-haired woman dressed in what appeared to be an armored flightsuit fashioned to resemble a high tech angel, codenamed “Mercy.”  _Tacky_ , Widow thought to herself.

Winston, a gorilla wearing an armored suit and…  _A pair of glasses?  Really?  I wonder what the story behind that is._

Some cowboy named Jesse McCree who looked as if he had stepped out of a cyberpunk spaghetti western.   _A cowboy, why not? Overwatch really will take in any misfit that comes their way._

And finally, there! She had found her quarry.  Widow clicked on “Tracer’s” profile, hoping she’d find more detailed information on the girl.  Instead, the profile only contained a list of the agent’s capabilities in battle and, at the bottom of the profile, there was a message in large, red, all-capital letters that said “ELIMINATE ON SIGHT.”

Sighing, Widow enlarged the picture of Tracer, wondering why this girl did something to her that no other person seemed capable of.  That smile, that face…

“ _Je ne peux pas continuer comme ça_!” she exclaimed to the empty room.   _There’s only one way I can get over this_ ennuyeux  _distraction_.

And so, Widow began to formulate a plan as to how she would be able to capture and interrogate the pretty little Overwatch agent.  She would figure these feelings out – one way or another.


	4. Visions of the Past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Widow dreams of things long-thought forgotten.

_Later that night, this room_

 

Widow was dreaming.  That in itself was not odd in the least bit.  What  _was_ odd was the content of the dream.  Usually, Widow’s dreams followed the same unfaltering plot: Talon gave her a mission to assassinate a high-level target, she located said target, then she eliminated them – typically with a bullet to the head.

She supposed that was one of the ways Talon hoped to keep her in line; if even her dreams were filled with the thrill of ending the lives of those who acted counter to the purposes of Talon, then wouldn’t she be content when most of her waking life was spent doing just that?

But no, tonight she dreamed about something else…

 

_It was nighttime, and Widow stood outside of the door of a house somewhere in France.  How she knew she was in France she did not know, but that was not important; what was important was the person – the target – who currently occupied the house._

_She pulled out her keys and used them to open the door, sliding silently inside._

_She thought to herself,_ Why do I have keys to this house?  Why am I not climbing in through a window to cut her throat or shoot her with a silenced pistol?  

_But then these questions swirled away into mist as she made her way silently up the staircase and paused outside of the doorway to the master bedroom._

_There was a light on in the room; the occupant was awake!  But instead of prepping to storm the room in an effort to catch the target unawares and end her life as quickly as possible, Widowmaker merely pushed the door open and stepped inside._

_Tracer looked up from the game she was playing on her ‘pad and, upon seeing Widow enter the room, said,_ “You’re here,” _with a smile on her lips and a light in her eyes._

_Widow’s breath came faster now.  But instead of showing any outward sign of excitement, she calmly stepped forward and simply repeated,_ “I’m here.”

_Tracer patted the spot next to her on the plush bed and gestured for Widow to come sit next to her._ “Come here, luv.”

_Obediently, Widow came around the side of the bed and, after stripping out of the dress she had worn to work earlier in the day –_ Wait, this isn’t what I wear when I report to Talon,  _she thought silently, and yet – Widow simply slipped into the bed next to Tracer, wearing only her bra and underwear._

“I missed you, luv,”  _Tracer said as Widow reached out an arm and let the smaller woman snuggle against her side, leaning her head on the taller woman’s shoulder._

_Widow surprised herself when she responded,_  “I missed you, too, Lena.” 

Her name’s Lena _, she thought to herself._ But didn’t I always know that?

_Then she surprised herself when she used her hand to gently lift Lena’s face to face her own, and leaned in to plant a soft kiss on the girl’s lips.  Widow let out a small moan as something inside of her clicked, but whatever that was, she didn’t want to spend time right now thinking about it._

_Their kiss deepened; Widow sought entrance to Lena's mouth with her tongue, and her lover obliged, making Widow's core burn with a desire so powerful she felt as if she had never experienced something like it before._

_One of Widow’s hands went to Lena’s inner thigh and began to slide its way upwards, as if it had a mind of its own.  Just short of its destination however, Lena reached down and placed her own hand on Widow’s wrist, gently pulling her arm away from its spot in between Lena’s legs._

_Lena broke their kiss and pulled back, but no too far; the tips of their noses touched and they could feel the warm puffs of each other's breath on their lips.  She gently whispered,_  “Luv, you’ve got a big mission to complete tonight.  We can do this another time.”

“But… but I  _need_  this,  _chérie_ ,” _Widow pleaded.  She really did need… whatever_ this _was.  It was burning her up inside.  Lena woke feelings in her that she hadn’t felt in a very long time, if ever.  What was the point of it, if she couldn’t act on the feelings; if she couldn’t satiate the_ need _Lena brought forth just by being in the same room as her?_

“I know, luv,”  _Lena continued in that calm and understanding tone,_  “We’ll have our chance, but for now, focus on your job.”

_And with that, everything around Widow turned to smoke and then, just as quickly, reassembled itself into an almost identical setting._

_She recognized the room as the same one she had just been in; all of the furniture was the same, even the bed.  The only things that had changed were that the lamp was now switched off and that instead of Lena next to Widow, a man was now sleeping peacefully, lowly snoring._

_It was as if a switch had flipped in Widow's head._

Ah, the target, _Widow thought to herself.  Silently, she slipped out of the bed, careful to not shake it too much, lest the target awaken before Widow could complete her assigned task.  She tip-toed to her recently shed work clothes and reached into the bag she had set down next to them.  She pulled out a compact and easily-hidden pistol, then pulled out a silencer and screwed it onto the small weapon’s tip.  She slowly, sloooowly made her way around to the other side of the bed, and stood over the man, looking down at him._

_For some reason, she paused._ I… I know him… don’t I?   _His name almost entered her thoughts.  It floated, as if it were a leaf just under the water’s surface that was her mind.  She reached for it mentally, but was interrupted by the man shifting his position in the bed._

_He looked up at her then, and said,_ “Amélie?”

_Her mind went blank._

_Then disjointed memories exploded into her mind, jumbled and disconnected.  Thoughts, feelings, sensations; all flew up and out from the murk of whatever it was that Talon had done to her.  She saw men and women that she had known; the ape and angel and the cowboy and others.  She was_ married _!_

_And the man before her laying on the bed with a puzzled look calmly asked in French,_ “Amélie, what are you planning on doing with that?” _gesturing to the gun tightly gripped in her right hand, now aimed at the floor._

_She couldn’t focus, she tried to grab ahold of the memories now rushing through her mind, but before she could grab onto anything solid, the Talon programming began snatching everything back down into the murk, as if it had experienced a temporary lapse then come back online, its slimy tentacles pulling everything that was Amélie out of her reach._

_All that was left was Widowmaker.  She knew what she had to do._

_She looked into the man’s eyes, lifted the pistol in her hand so that it was level with his head, and fired._

_The gun gave a slight recoil, but she was trained and her hand didn’t waver in the slightest.  The man’s body went limp almost immediately, the light leaving his eyes.  She watched as blood trickled from the hole centered between the man’s eyes, and reveled in the luxurious reward of the kill, as the programming in her mind stimulated her pleasure senses with a dose of dopamine._

_But then, something snagged against that luxurious feeling.  It was… a name._

_Gérard._

_Widow dropped the gun and screamed.  She had just killed her husband._

Widow shot bolt upright in her bed, covered from head to toe in cold sweat and… what was that wet substance trickling out of the ducts in her eyelids?  She reached up with both of her hands, brushing her fingers along her upper cheeks and her lower eyelids.  

She was crying. 

Widowmaker didn’t  _cry_.  Widowmaker didn’t feel; she didn’t  _need_  to feel.  She only  _felt_  as a reward for doing Talon’s bidding.

And then she remembered the end of the dream, and what she had done.  She could remember that Tracer – no,  _Lena_ , had pulled forth feelings that only one other person had ever made her feel: her husband, Gérard.  The man she had murdered.

_Did I really kill him?_ A search of both the public and Talon databases yielded nothing on the man.  And yet, she knew she had.  She was almost certain.   _I need to talk to Lena.  I need to know what she knows.  I need_ her.

The disruption all of this caused was keeping her from the necessary rest and mental soundness required to perform her duty to Talon.  Not to mention the fact that she was being torn up inside.  Her mind was made: She would find Lena, get the information she needed from the Overwatch agent, and then either eliminate the girl or…  _Or what?_   She asked herself.   _The only choice is to eliminate her, right?_

She couldn’t wait any longer to figure out how she was going to capture the agent.  She needed to finish planning and do it as soon as possible, otherwise Talon would be down their best assassin, and they would  _not_  like that.

She pulled up the list of necessary supplies for her personal “mission,” which included some heavy sedatives (the girl was capable of bending time to her will, so long-lasting drugs were necessary) and an immobilizing net. 

_Fitting_ , she thought to herself, _I am the spider, and she is the fly that will fall into my web._ She frowned.  Lena was not just a simple fly.   _No, she is a butterfly_.  At that thought, Widow smiled. 

She would be ready in less than a week.  Now she just had to actually get the supplies and do some long-distance recon to find out the girl’s movements.


	5. The Truth Can Hurt, But It Can Also Heal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Same as the chapter's title.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I stayed up til three in the morning cause I felt the urge to write this chapter lol. Hope ya like it! As always, kudos and comments are much appreciated ;D

_Currently, the same room_

“…I remembered a name.  Two names, to be precise.”  Widowmaker sighed, leaning back into her chair for support.  She leaned back at an angle, placing her right elbow on the arm of the chair and using her right hand to support her head.  She left her other arm awkwardly laid across her lap, as if she didn’t quite know what to do with it.

Lena took her captor’s momentary pause to fully examine the other woman. 

 _She looks tired_ , Lena thought to herself.

Widowmaker had dark circles underneath her eyes, as if she hadn’t slept well – if at all – in days.  She currently wore a form-fitting t-shirt and black jeans, but no jewelry or socks.

Lena couldn’t help but think to herself that even in her disheveled state, Widowmaker still somehow managed to maintain a grace and beauty that few possessed.  Lena would have been content to continue admiring Widowmaker’s form, even with Lena’s being restrained on the other woman’s bed (now doesn’t  _that_  conjure up some sexy imagery) but alas, it was not to last. 

Widowmaker cleared her throat, then continued what she had started saying a few moments ago, “Your name is Lena, correct?”

Lena nodded once.

Widowmaker continued in an uncharacteristically small voice, as if she were afraid to ask her next question: “Did… did I use to know you?”

Instead of answering, Lena asked a question of her own, “What exactly happened, luv?  Why do ya think you’re rememberin’ things now?”

Widowmaker paused, thinking on what exactly had happened to make her remember what she had.  Then she replied in a shaky voice, “I had a dream.  In it, I saw… things.  It all felt like more than just a dream, though; they were like broken memories of things that happened to me and of the people I used to know, but it’s as if all of that is hidden behind a curtain in my mind.  I had hoped that you would be able to help me understand.”  She looked pleadingly to Lena as if the bound woman had all of the answers.

Inside, Lena was ecstatic,  _She’s remembering!  Whatever Talon did to her, things must be coming back to her!_    _The old Amélie must be trying to break free!_  

Then another thought occurred to Lena, and she said in a bubblier voice than one would expect from someone currently being held hostage, “Listen luv, I’ll answer all of your questions, but I’m gonna need ya to let me outta these restraints; kinda hard to think with zip ties cuttin’ into your wrists an’ ankles, ya know?”

 

Widow was unsure of how to proceed: she could either keep the other woman restrained and force her to answer her questions with the possible application of torture, or she could cut her prisoner’s ties and show Lena a level of trust – show her that Widow either trusted that she would not attempt to escape or that the assassin trusted her skills enough that the time-hopper wouldn’t be able to escape even if she tried. 

She went with her gut.  She stood up out of her chair without saying a word, and stepped over to her bedside nightstand.  She opened the drawer and pulled out a switch-knife.

 

Even with her usual bubbly persona in place, Lena watched all of this unfold with a growing sense of unease.  Lena knew that the knife could simply be for cutting her restraints, but a small part of her feared that Widowmaker was going to resort to torture in order to pull the information she wanted out of her.

 _Well_ , she thought,  _either way, I’m not getting’ outta this unless she_ lets _me out._

 

Widow turned back to the bed and paused.  The programming made a push forward in her mind, clouding it with images of using the knife to slit Lena’s throat, ending the agent’s threat to Talon and removing yet another obstacle; fulfilling Widow’s purpose and promising the pleasure and rush that always came with a kill.

She gritted her teeth and screwed her eyes shut, shaking her head against the thoughts,  _No no NO.  I need her; I need her to tell me what she knows!  I can’t kill her, no!_

Her struggle was obvious, and Lena’s voice cut through the programming’s noise and the assassin’s own thoughts as she said not insincerely, “Everything all right, luv?”  Lena actually looked worried about her, and not about the knife she was holding.

Widow smiled a genuine smile and replied, “ _Oui_ , I apologize; just a headache is all.”   _I’m holding her captive, and she’s worried about_ moi.   _Such a sweet, foolish girl_ , she thought.

She then cut Lena’s restraints, the Brit rubbing her wrists and ankles to get the circulation going again while muttering out a small “Thanks.”

Widow placed the knife back in the drawer and closed it, pushing away the lingering thoughts of running the blade across the other woman’s throat.  She then said, “I’m sorry for all of this,” as she gestured with her arms, spreading them out to either side, palms facing upwards as if to encompass the entire room.  “I needed to get you alone to talk, and I restrained you because I did not want you to try to fight me or hurt yourself upon waking up.”  She didn’t know why she kept apologizing to Lena – she didn’t know why she felt like she had to explain herself to her, for that matter.  But something she couldn’t quite put her finger on made her feel as if it was the right thing to do.

Then Lena laughed –  _laughed!_  – a genuine laugh and said with a smile something the assassin had not expected at all, “Luv, I woulda talked to you if you had just  _asked_  me!  You didn’t have to  _kidnap_  me just to get some answers.”

Widow was dumfounded, but she regained her wits quickly and responded, “But I’ve killed so many.  Surely you must think me some kind of monster, a  _démon_  of death.  Why would you ever agree to willingly talk to me?  Would you not attempt to arrest me or make me ‘ _pay for my crimes’_?”  Widow could not help but add a sarcastic tone to the last part.  But she really did want to know why the Overwatch agent seemed to have been willing to converse with the assassin as if they were not on opposite sides of a major factional-conflict.

“Cause,” Lena started, “I knew you from before you were… were…  _this_ ,” she said as she gestured with one hand up and down Widow’s body, as if just seeing her was evidence of the change that had occurred when Widow had come into Talon’s service – which of course it was, because she had not always been blue and have an almost corpse-like body temperature.  “If you’re willing to try an’ remember who you once were, face the pain of that, then I am a hundred percent behind you.  You were a good person, once,” she continued.

Lena’s tone when she said ‘once’ made Widow feel something; a sadness that went beyond just feeling a little down and instead spread throughout her whole body, causing her to feel as if a weight was pulling her physically down.  She sat back in the chair and questions floated through her mind,  _why do I feel this way?  Why did it have to come to this?_  

And most importantly:  _Who_ am _I?_

She must have uttered that last question aloud, because she felt at first, rather than saw, Lena reach out and place a warm, calloused hand on one of Widow’s own.  Lena’s warm hazel eyes locked with Widow’s own almond-gold ones as she said, “Let me tell you.”

 

Lena started with talking about how she had met Amélie, which was through Gérard.  When she said his name, Widowmaker’s eyes had seemed to cloud over, as if haunted by a memory of something far and away.  Widowmaker actually had to look away when Lena mentioned how happy the French couple had seemed to be.  She talked about the wedding, mentioned other agents like Mercy and Winston, and how Amélie was always the brightest light in the room, especially when she baked cookies. 

Then, with a frown, she moved on to the kidnapping, the desperate search, the rescue and supposed recovery, and finally the murder of Gérard and Amélie’s final disappearance.

 

When Lena finished, Widow just stared at the far wall, shell-shocked.  She quietly repeated to herself, “My name is Amélie Lacroix.  I was married to Gérard Lacroix.”  Then she seemed to draw in on herself, drawing her arms around herself as she began to shake, an internal dam breaking as she sobbed out, “I  _killed_  him!  I murdered my  _husband!_ ”  She cried this out and continued to choke out sobs, her whole body wracked with the grief of the confirmation of what she had feared had been true the whole time.

Then Lena got off of the bed and went to Widow – no – Amélie, placing her arms around the bereaved woman’s shoulders and guiding her to sit next to Lena on the edge of the bed.  

Amélie wrapped her arms around Lena and cried into the smaller woman’s chest, seeking comfort from the only person she felt truly understood her in the world at this point. 

As she continued to cry, Lena patted her back and ran a hand through the woman’s hair, trying to soothe her.  She whispered comfort, ‘It’s okay,’ ‘I know, I know,’ ‘I’m here,’ ‘Shhh, it’s okay, it’s okay.’

After a few minutes, Amélie’s sobs died down and her crying ceased, and then she looked up at Lena with eyes that looked like those of someone who had been lost for a very long time.  She asked,  _pleaded_  in a small voice, “Please stay with me… I need someone.  I don’t want to be alone.”

It only took Lena a moment to make up her mind and she said, “Of course I’ll stay with ya, luv.  I did say I’m here for ya after all.  Just let me call Winston so I can tell him everything’s fine; he’s probably raising hell lookin’ for me right now.”  She smiled, imagining the gorilla scientist handing out pieces of paper with Lena’s picture on it and the message ‘MISSING: British woman who can bend time itself; REWARD: Lifetime supply of bananas and peanut butter.’

 

Amélie frowned, unsure if Lena would truly give Winston the all-clear or call for help.   _But why would she do that after having already told me everything?  After she held me while I cried like a_ putain  _newborn?_

Still looking down at her, Lena smiled and, as if she read her mind, said, “I promise I’ll just say everything’s okay.  I’ll just say it was an emergency and that I’m safe with a friend; that everything’s all right now.  Okay?”

Amélie nodded once and said, “ _Oui_ ,” then she reluctantly slid out of Lena’s warm embrace so that the other woman could make the call.

 

Lena gave Amélie a reassuring smile as they reluctantly released from each other; Lena had to admit it, she had felt a thrill run though her at the contact with Amélie, something she had craved – somewhat guiltily – from even before Amélie had been abducted.

Pushing those thoughts out of her mind, she stood up from the bed and walked over to the window.  Reaching into her pants pocket, she found that her headphones were still there and intact.  Plugging them into the jack on her accelerator, she keyed in the special frequency and said, “Winston?  Winston, are ya there, luv?”

There was only static for about two seconds before it was replaced by the deep rumbling – and extremely relief-filled – voice of her gorilla scientist friend, “Lena! You’ve been missing for almost two days!  Where are you? Are you all right?  What  _happened_  to you?”  The questions rolled out as fast as bullets from a machine gun.

Lena couldn’t help but giggle before she replied, “I’m fine, luv.  Really, I am.  There was an emergency; it’s all good now though.  I’m with a friend,” she glanced over at Amélie, but immediately averted her gaze when she realized the other woman was in the middle of changing out of the clothes she had been wearing and into her sleepwear.  Instead, she refocused on Winston and said, “I just wanted to stay with her to make sure she was okay.”

She could hear Winston release a long sigh, then he responded, “I was really worried about you, Lena.  You scared me.  I thought you had been kidnapped or something; you left all of your gear in your locker, even the parts to your accelerator!”

“I needed to get to my friend ASAP,  _dad_ ,” she said, knowing Winston hated it when she called him dad – it made him feel old and he didn’t like seeing himself as a senior citizen, not quite yet.

She heard him go ‘ _hmph_ ’ then chuckle himself as he replied, “Fine, fine; I get it.  I’m just glad you’re okay.  Try not to scare me like that.  I might not be your real father, but I still worry about you.  When will you be back?”

She smiled; Winston was one of the kindest people she had ever had the pleasure of knowing.  She glanced at Amélie again, now lying in bed staring blankly up at the ceiling.  She replied to Winston, “I’m not sure.  It might be a couple of days.  Tell ya what, I’ll call ya back and let you know as soon as I’m sure.”

“All right, just don’t get into too much trouble.  See you then.”

“See ya then, luv.”  And with that, she keyed off the transmission and took her earbuds out.

 _Now onto the next problem_ , she thought to herself.

Looking to Amélie, she timidly asked, “Sooooooo… If I’m gonna stay with ya tonight, where should I sleep?”  There wasn’t really anywhere she could sleep besides the floor, and that was a very unattractive choice.  Which meant the only other option was…

“You can sleep next to me, if that’s not too uncomfortable for you,” the current occupant of the small bed replied, now looking at Lena, instead of the spot on the ceiling she had been blankly staring at moments before.  “Either that, or you can sleep in the bathtub.  I can’t guarantee that I'll wake you up before I get in for a shower though,  _chérie_ ,” she said with a small and slightly flirtatious smile.

Lena gave her a lopsided grin and said, “In your dreams, luv.”  Inwardly, Lena thought,  _At least she’s making banter; she’s either handling this better than most or she’s suppressing it_.  Lena really hoped it was the former; she had personal experience with the latter from when Winston had saved her from being lost forever in the time-stream.  Pushing tragedies into the subconscious only served to damage a person further, not help heal and grow.

Another potential problem occurred to her, and she asked Amélie, “Hey, so another potential problem.  I kind of smell like a sack of shite; these clothes were the ones I was wearing when… y’know, and I had been exercising.  Mind if I use your shower and wash up?”

Amélie nodded and said, “Of course.  You can take one of my shirts and, well, I’m not sure how to help you with underwear; I think mine are all too big for you.”

It was true.  Amélie was about half a foot taller than Lena, give or take.  Lena walked over to Amélie’s closet and, after receiving a nod from the owner, opened it up.  After scrounging through its contents, she came away with an obviously oversized shirt and a pair of shorts.  “These’ll do just fine,” she happily announced.  Then she said, “Be back in fifteen!” and entered Amélie’s bathroom with the intent of rubbing the stink and sweat residue from her body.

 

Amélie smiled as she watched Lena go into her bathroom and close the door with a backwards kick of her foot. 

 _Such a strange turn of events this has been_ , she thought.   _In the space of a couple of hours, we go from mortal enemies from warring organizations to holding each other as one cries and flirting._

She heard the shower turn on and said aloud, “ _La vie est étrange, n’est ce pas_?”

And with that, she closed her eyes and scooted to the side of the bed so as to leave space for Lena, then fell into a deep, yet restless, sleep.

 

When Lena stepped out of the bathroom, hair still slightly damp and wearing just Amélie’s much-too-big shirt and slightly oversized shorts – and her chronal accelerator underneath the shirt, of course – she tried to not make too much noise since Amélie was breathing the deep and steady rhythm of someone deep in dreamland.

 _Good_ , she thought to herself,  _she needs it._   She frowned, reflecting on the day’s events, _Poor thing, her whole world was shattered.  She went from robotic-assassin to a crying mess in a space of hours._ But then Lena smiled as she thought to herself,  _At least I’ll be here to help her pick up the pieces; come back to herself._

And with that thought in her mind, she walked around the bed and slid in next to Amélie, pulling the loose blanket up over herself and laying a hand under her head on the single pillow that the women were sharing.  She sighed a sigh that turned into a yawn as she realized how exhausted she was from what had happened, so she closed her eyes and drifted off to her own dreamland.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before you ask, the answer is yes. Lena and Amelie are in a bed together. Sexy times will follow. See ya then! ;D


	6. They Say the Universe Started With a Bang

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena and Amelie finally acknowledge that thick sexual tension that's been slowly building, and then they do something about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is my attempt at working sex into the story without it seeming too unnatural; just hope it worked lol. Also, I went back and edited all of the previous chapters; just wanted to make things sound smoother and clarify thoughts and actions that may have not been so clear when I originally posted them.
> 
> As always, comments and kudos are greatly appreciated - enjoy!! ;D

_Dawn the next day, this room_

 

Lena woke to the sounds of low, fearful moaning and nonsense words coming from her left.  She looked to the woman lying next to her and saw that Amélie’s mouth was moving as her face contorted into a look of fear; she appeared to be trapped in the grip of an extreme nightmare.  She listened for a moment as the sleeping woman slurred out  _‘Non non non’_  to whatever visions were assaulting her, whether they be horrid moments from her past or specters from beyond the grave who had come back to torment her.

 _Like Gérard_ , she sadly thought.

 Lena turned on the bed to face Amélie and reached across the small distance between them to stroke the woman’s cheek.  She ran her fingertips and thumb along the side of the sleeping woman’s face, tenderly whispering, “It’s okay luv, I’m here.  Shhhh, don’t worry, I’m here now.  You’re okay.  You’re safe.”  As she continued to run her fingers along Amélie’s soft cheek, she noticed that the other woman’s smooth skin was not quite as cold as before – still cooler than a normal person’s skin, but better than it had been.  She also noticed how the light from the sun just beginning to crest the horizon made Amélie’s periwinkle skin almost seem to glow in a pleasing shade of even lighter blue.

 _She really is a beauty, ain’t she_ , Lena thought to herself as she watched Amélie escape from the clutches of whatever nightmare she had been having; the other woman’s face relaxing and returning to the peaceful look of someone enjoying much-needed sleep.

 

A short time later, Amélie awoke.

Two things occurred to her: it must have only been just after dawn, if the dim light coming through the curtained-windows was anything to go by; and that Lena was gently stroking her face with her pleasantly-warm hands, probably in an attempt to calm her because of the nightmare she had been having.  She internally shuddered, remembering the visions from which she had escaped.

_Talon had trapped Lena and Amélie in a room together.  The only way to escape alive was for one of them to swear allegiance to the terrorist organization by killing the other woman.  Amélie was horrified; she didn’t want to end Lena’s life – she wanted to be with the other woman; to experience her life with her.  She didn’t want to serve Talon’s horrid purposes anymore._

_Then a gun appeared in her hands, and she raised it to point at Lena.  The Brit’s eyes had gone wide in fear, but then horror as Amélie turned the gun on herself._

It’s the only way _, she had thought._

_But then, something happened.  A warm sensation had spread through her body, starting with her cheek and radiating from there all the way to the tips of her fingers and toes, making her feel as if everything was going to be all right._

This isn’t real _, she had thought to herself._

_Then the room, the gun, and even the horrified Lena fell away, replaced instead by a comfortable bed in a dimly lit room, shared by two women who had recently become much closer than either had ever anticipated becoming._

And then she had woken up to the hands of the woman she was sharing a bed with gently stroking her face, brushing her fears away.

 

Amélie opened her eyes and smiled, Lena couldn’t know the calming effect she had on her.   _Her hand is so warm_ , she thought.  She closed her eyes as she gently leaned into the hand stroking her cheek and, without thinking, kissed the palm.

The hand paused for a moment, but then continued to stroke her cheek as the women lay in bed, facing each other.  Rich hazel eyes gazed into almond-gold ones as each woman felt the warm puffs of their breath on each other’s lips, their noses only inches apart on the shared pillow.

Neither made a move, save for the warm hand gently stroking a cool face; both women gazing warmly at the other, apparently waiting for... something. Neither knew exactly what that something was, but they couldn't deny the fact that they felt drawn to each other in such an unexpected and intimate setting.

With a start, Amélie realized that their current situation was not unlike what had happened in the dream that had set her on this path in the first place. It had felt so natural in her dream to kiss Lena; as if in a time long-forgotten she had often imagined and wondered what it would be like to press her lips against the other woman's. 

And now she had her chance.

 _Do it_  – a little voice, different than that of Talon’s programming, said in her head.  And so she did.  Amélie gently slid her head forward on the pillow, not taking the time to find a reason to stop, and closed the distance between their faces and gently pressed her lips to Lena’s.

Lena sucked in a quick breath through her nose as her eyes widened, but within seconds she had closed her eyes and reciprocated.  The kiss was at first light, a gentle pressure that seemed timid but not uncomfortable.  Lena cupped the other woman’s cheek as they grew accustomed to each other.  Then Amélie pulled back and looked at Lena, as if she was looking for permission to continue.

Lena smiled and gently whispered in the voice one uses in the wee hours of the morning, “Y’know, I’ve been looking forward to doing that for a long time, luv.   _But_ … are you sure this is what you want?  With everything that’s happened… what happened last night…”  She trailed off, searching Amélie’s eyes for a response.

Lena’s concern made Amélie smile.  She leaned her face slightly into the hand still cupping her cheek and whispered, “Even before last night, before I came for you… I’ve wanted to kiss you.  You make me feel a way no one else does… not even like Gérard did.” 

Lena gave a small surprised gasp at the last admission, searching Amélie’s eyes for the explanation.

Amélie simply said, “I want this, Lena.  I want  _you_.”  Then she leaned in again, and they kissed.  It was at first gentle, but then Amélie slowly brought an arm around to Lena’s back and placed a hand on the nape of her neck, deepening the kiss.

 

The kiss had surprised Lena, but to be honest, she had wanted this, too.  For a very long time.  And so she accepted the kiss as Amélie applied more pressure, parting her lips to both allow Amélie entrance to her mouth and herself entrance to Amélie’s.  Their tongues mingled, tasting each other, and both women’s eyes began to cloud over with what could only be described as _want_. 

Lena wanted to stay in this moment forever; kissing Amélie, feeling as if all of their problems had fallen away into blissful nothingness. 

But, they both needed to breathe, and so they broke for air.

 

Amélie had taken charge with both of their initial kisses, and that didn’t change when they shifted to sitting positions and she began to run kisses along Lena’s jawline and down her neck, the contact leaving a trail of fire in its wake.  Amélie made it to her pulse-point and lightly sucked on it, drawing a moan out of Lena, who had begun to run her fingers through Amélie’s hair over and over.  Her sounds of pleasure spurred Amélie on as she continued to kiss the woman’s neck, collarbone, exposed shoulder.

She gently placed a hand on the bottom of Lena’s shirt then asked, “May I,  _chérie_?”

Lena responded by looking into Amélie’s eyes with a look of pure lust and nodded hungrily.

Amélie gently pulled the shirt up Lena’s body, slowly exposing more and more of the pale Brit’s skin.  She kissed along her exposed stomach and made her way up, following the shirt.  She stopped when she reached the chronal accelerator still strapped to Lena’s chest, but instead of asking about it, she simply moved around it, feeling the warmth radiating from it onto her face. 

The shirt came off, but she hesitated then, faced with Lena’s essentially bare chest.  The Brit chuckled, then said, “They don’t  _bite_ , luv…  but I will, if you’re into that sorta thing,” she said with a cheeky smirk on her lips and a suggestive wink.

Amélie’s response was crush their lips together again, kissing Lena deeply, hungry for more.  When they broke for air, she kissed her way back down Lena’s neck again and, after kissing along the line of freckles on her upper chest, brought a hand up and gently cupped Lena’s right breast and began massaging it.  Amélie kissed around Lena’s hardened left nipple, then took it into her mouth, gently sucking and grazing her teeth along it, causing Lena to close her eyes and make small sounds of pleasure as she ran one hand up and down Amélie’s back, underneath the woman’s chemise.  Lena’s other hand was entwined with Amélie’s long hair, massaging her scalp while Amélie worked on her breasts.   

Soon, Amélie leaned back, balancing on her knees.  She pulled her chemise up and over her head.  Lena’s eyes popped wide – Amélie could’ve sworn she saw Lena start to drool – when Amélie’s ample breasts popped free of her sleepwear.  Amélie couldn’t help but smirk and chuckle as the Brit blinked a couple of times, then shook her head as if coming back to herself.  She leaned in and kissed the space between Amélie’s breasts, running her slender hands up and down the outside of the other woman’s arms and along her sides.  Then she reciprocated what Amélie had done earlier, gripping one breast and massaging it while using her mouth to stimulate the other, making Amélie press her lips into the top of Lena’s head, running her hands through the woman’s short, spiky hair as a sensation began to grow in her core – a burning need that sought to be fulfilled.

Lena pulled back from Amélie’s breast with a  _pop!_  that served only to make that desperate burning in her core grow in intensity.  They kissed, then Lena did something unexpected: she pulled the Frenchwoman close to her and flipped their positions, which ended up with a surprised Amélie laying on her back, head on her pillow, and Lena sitting on her waist, straddling her.  

Lena leaned down and kissed Amélie again, then began to make her way down her body, first kissing along her neck, then in between Amélie’s breasts.  When Lena made it to her stomach, she trailed her kisses with her fingernails, gently running them down the sensitive spots, making Amélie shudder from the pleasurable sensation. 

She made it to the woman’s nether regions – still covered by a pair of lace underwear – then stopped and looked back up to Amélie.  A part of her still felt uneasy about what was transpiring, and so she asked, “I just want to make sure, luv.  Are you sure you really want this?”

Instead of instantly answering her, Amélie took a moment to seriously consider what was about to happen.  She looked off into the distance and thought about what Lena had told her the night before; about what had led Amélie to becoming Widowmaker; about Amélie’s history with Overwatch; about Gérard. 

Then she thought about Lena; how she felt safe and unafraid of who she was with Lena; how she felt a connection with the other woman she had not experienced in a very long time- if ever.  She thought of her nightmare, and of the desperation she had felt to save Lena’s life; how Lena had pulled her out of the cold darkness and replaced it with warmth and light.  She made up her mind. 

Amélie leaned up on an elbow in order to reach forward with her other hand, then gently ran her thumb along Lena’s cheek as she said, “I’m sure, _chérie_.  You’re not taking advantage of me, I promise.”  She reassured Lena with a smile, and repeated herself, “I promise.”

 

Lena smiled back, eyes filled with adoration.  She nodded once as she replied, “Okay, luv.”   _Here we go…_  Lena thought to herself.  She worked her fingers underneath Amélie’s waistband, then gently pulled her underwear down her thighs and off over her feet.

Both Amélie’s and Lena’s already-flushed cheeks warmed even more at the fact that Amélie lay completely bare, exposing herself in her entirety to Lena. 

Lena took a breath, then leaned down and kissed the inside of Amélie’s knee, slowly trailing kisses along the inside of her thigh while running her hands along the outside of her thighs.  As she got closer and closer to Amélie’s folds, she skipped over them and went to her other knee, and began to work her way back down again.  The taller woman made a desperate sound, the teasing only serving to make her burning desire all the much more powerful.  Finally, Lena leaned in and ran her tongue up the length of Amélie’s slick folds, pulling a loud moan of pleasure out of the other woman. 

She went slowly, using her tongue to work Amélie’s folds and clit.  Amélie alternated between letting out quiet moans and whispering, “ _oui_ ,” over and over again.  Lena began to speed up her pace and pressure, and Amélie couldn’t help but buck her hips into Lena’s skilled tongue.  Her moans became louder and she reached up with both hands to massage her own breasts, tweaking her hardened nipples. 

Lena took Amélie’s actions as encouragement, and she slipped first one, then two fingers into Amélie’s slick folds, thrusting and curling her fingers, hitting those oh-so-sensitive pleasure spots.  Lena pursed her lips on Amélie’s clit and alternated between lightly sucking and running her tongue on and around it. 

Amélie was close; the boiling in her gut was ready to explode; her muscles began to tense and suddenly, the first orgasm she had had since becoming Widowmaker ripped through her body.  Her inner walls clamped on Lena’s fingers, her back arched and her hips bucked uncontrollably, she screamed a scream of pure pleasure and release as she tightly gripped her bedsheets, as if to anchor herself in reality.

When it was over, she collapsed back onto the bed, lost in a dizzying high.  Lena crawled up next to her and kissed the side of her neck, then her cheek, then her lips.  At the end of the last kiss, Amélie gazed fondly into Lena’s eyes, smiling. 

Then she began to kiss Lena’s neck as her hand ran down the Brit’s back to her butt, and gave it a squeeze.  Lena squeaked in surprise and her thigh muscles tensed, which caused her to press her body forward and against Amélie.  Amélie felt Lena’s wetness press against her thigh through her borrowed shorts, and she had an idea.  First, she reached down and pulled the shorts off of Lena, then she shifted her own thigh and slipped it between Lena’s, pressing it flush against the girl’s soaked folds as she wrapped her arms around the girl’s back, pulling her into a tight embrace.  Lena gasped and began to rock against Amélie’s thigh, moaning as the friction stimulated her in just the right way.  What Amélie hadn’t planned on was Lena’s thigh ending up between her own as well, but hey, that was just an added bonus.

They held to each other tightly as they bucked into each other, using each other’s thighs to work themselves closer and closer to climax.  Before they both knew it, they were moaning into each other’s necks as they went rigid, holding tightly to each other as they orgasmed.  They lost themselves in the pleasure, flying in a vast void, empty of worry and thought.  Then, they slowly came back down to reality, lightly gasping for breath and still holding each other in a close embrace.

When they had caught their breath, they simply gazed into each other’s eyes; Amélie lost in Lena’s rich hazel; Lena lost in Amélie’s deep almond-gold. 

“That…” Lena started, “That was amazing, luv.”

Amélie giggled –  _giggled!_  – and repeated, “ _C’était incroyable, chérie_.”

Then they untangled their legs and shifted to lay on their backs, looking up at the ceiling.  After a few minutes had passed, Lena gave an awkward cough, then said, “Sooo… what’re we callin’ this?  Us, I mean,” she said as she gestured to their naked bodies.

Amélie looked at her and pursed her lips.  “What do you  _want_  to call it,  _chérie_?” she asked.

Lena cleared her throat and looked rapidly around the room as she said, “Uh, well, I mean, I want to say we’re  _together_  – I mean, that was some _really_  good sex, like, better than I had ever imagined it would be-”

Amélie arched a perfect eyebrow and gave her a bemused smile.  “So, you’d like to say we’re dating now,  _chérie_?”

Lena spluttered, then said, “Well, yeah, but we’ve never really done anything together, ya know?  Besides fighting, of course.  But that was more like something we were doing  _against_  each other, instead of together.  Like we should go out to dinner, or something,” she finished with a blush.

 _She’s so cute_ , Amélie thought as a wave of warmth and adoration spread through her body.  “How about this,  _ma beauté_ :  Why don’t we clean ourselves up, get dressed, and go out for lunch?  We can spend the day together – a date,” she said with a smile.  That smile turned to a suggestive smirk when she said, “Except, I believe that the sex is supposed to come  _after_  said date,  _ma chérie_.”

Lena’s face took on even more of a pinkish hue as she looked away and sheepishly said, “Yeah, well… that was nice though, right?”

Amélie leaned in and caught her lips with her own, then said, lips still pressed to Lena’s, “It wasn’t just nice; it was  _magnifique_.”

Lena blushed an adorable shade of red, then asked, “Should we start getting ready now, or…?”

Amélie laid back down on the pillow and wrapped the smaller woman into a soft one-armed embrace, Lena laying her head on Amélie’s shoulder.  “We’ve got plenty of time, _chérie_.  Let’s lay here for a little while longer.”

Lena snuggled closer into Amélie’s side, letting loose a contented sigh.  They watched the sun rise through the room’s single window in comfortable silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There ya have it, folks. They have begun a journey that will span from now to - I hope - a final conftrontation between two certain major groups and the fall of one of the said major groups. Did I just reveal my grand plan? That's for me to know and for you guys to find out! See ya next time!! ;D


	7. Decisions, Decisions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amelie is plagued by thoughts of Talon and what her current options are for her immediate future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted to thank everyone who has commented and left a kudos on this story; I honestly didn't think I would receive so much positive feedback, nor get so many views. 
> 
> So, Thank You readers, I appreciate you.
> 
> Now, read on and enjoy!

_Currently, the same room_

 

They had watched as the light coming through the curtains steadily grew stronger, indicating the sun’s morning rise.  They had planned to get out of bed, but they were content and tired from their early-morning sex.  Lena was the first to fall back asleep, still held in Amélie’s arms.  Amélie had smiled fondly and kissed the Brit’s forehead.  Instead of falling asleep however, she stared up at the spot on the ceiling directly above her that she had spent many a night staring at when mulling over troubling thoughts, nightmares, even how she would carry out an assassination.  This time, she thought about what had happened in the last few days.

It might seem insane to the “average” person that in the space of a few days, Amélie and Lena had gone from sworn enemies to intense lovers, but Amélie knew better.  In their line of work – more so for Overwatch than for Talon – love was difficult to come by. 

In Talon, you were turned into what was essentially a cold robot without feelings, so warmth towards anything was essentially nonexistent. 

Overwatch was a different story.  When an agent found love, they grabbed onto it with both hands and didn’t let go.  You just never knew when you’d get assigned a mission from which you wouldn’t be returning.  Love was also the reason that some agents managed to return from those so-called suicide missions. 

Lena had told Amélie that Amélie and Gérard had gotten married after only eight months because, ‘You knew the risks.  You loved him.  That was enough.’  While she didn’t remember every detail, Amélie knew it was true.  And it was for that reason and many others that she had opened up to Lena the night before and made love to her earlier in the morning.   _She knew the dangers, and she knew how she felt about Lena.  She wanted to make it clear how strongly she felt for Lena through action.  Which brought them to today._

Amélie thought on what they had agreed upon before Lena had drifted back into sleep.  Lena had made the excuse to Winston that she needed a couple of days to be with her “friend,” so that was already taken care of.  Amélie had just pulled off a big assassination of an ambassador to the United Nations (he was extremely corrupt and engaged in human trafficking and money laundering, so Amélie didn’t feel guilty about ending his life) before she had kidnap- borrowed Lena, so Talon would probably give her at least a couple days of rest before contacting her again. 

The thought of Talon  _not_ immediately ruining something in her life thrilled Amélie; it made her slow heartrate speed up that much more, and it made her feel  _happy_.  It was this happiness that spurred her to action.  Pressing another kiss to the sleeping Lena’s smooth forehead, she gently disentangled herself from the lanky girl and slid out of the bed.

If the two women planned on spending the day together, Lena would need some clothes that she could wear outside; Amélie only had what she had bought for herself with the funds supplied by Talon as well as a few of the ridiculous catsuits Talon had supplied her to be worn on missions.  While the mental image of Lena wearing one of those revealing catsuits pleased Amélie to no end, she knew that wasn’t a viable option, just as having her wear Amélie’s too-large civilian clothes wasn’t as well.

And so she quietly padded to her bathroom on bare feet with the intent of taking a shower.  She would then make a trip to a nearby clothes store where she could get Lena some proper outfits.  Before entering the bathroom, Amélie turned and looked at the sleeping girl, who had shifted so that she was on her stomach, arms and legs spread out with her whole body at an angle, her head sideways on the pillow.  She was lightly snoring.

For the umpteenth time, Amélie marveled at just how much Lena made her feel so warm and happy inside.  These feelings were new, powerful, and simply…  _right_.  Something inside her told her that this was how it was supposed to be.  She felt something for Lena that felt akin to what she had felt a long time ago, for a man who she had almost no memories of. 

She sighed inwardly, thinking to herself.   _I knew her before Talon.  I felt something for her even then, and it was that feeling that made me remember and open up to her and start to feel again.  Is it_  ridicules  _of me to think I’m falling for her?_ The only problem – and it was a  _big_ problem – was that they were members of warring organizations who fully expected to hear from both women at some point in the near future.  Instead of thinking the issue through to its logical endpoint, Amélie did something that she almost never did; she pushed the train of thought out of her mind, content with ignoring the problem for the time being.

She turned from the sight of her lover sleeping on her bed and entered the bathroom, quietly closing the door behind her.  First she used the toilet, then she stood and flushed it.  She was still nude from before, so all she had to do was pull aside the shower curtain and switch on the shower.  She pressed the shiny silver handle about three-fifths of the way to the left, ensuring that her shower would be nice and hot.  She then stepped in and began the process of wetting all parts of her body before she began to actually wash herself.

As the air filled with hot steam and the water rained down on her face and body, it occurred to Amélie that she hadn’t even told Lena where they were in the world; she had dodged the question when the Brit had asked upon waking up the night before.  Amélie pursed her lips for a moment and made a silent promise to tell Lena where they were and ask if she had any other questions.  There was no reason to keep her in the dark.

Then she pushed all of her worries and thoughts to the side and instead focused on simply enjoying her shower; something she hadn’t done in a very long time.  As Widowmaker, she had taken the fastest shower possible, using cold water for her cold skin and taking no time to simply soak in the peace of mind that taking a shower for some reason brought to most people.  Now, she closed her eyes and hummed a tune to herself as she worked shampoo into her long dark-indigo hair and enjoyed the feeling of the air in the bathroom as it became thick and humid from the heat of the shower.

After she had finished soaping up her lithe body and then washed off, she got out of the shower and toweled off.  She used one of her hands to wipe condensation off of her mirror in order to look at her reflection; she looked tired, but her eyes had a certain spark that hadn't been there before.  It reassured her that she was doing the right thing, exploring her feelings and embracing them.

She left the bathroom with one towel wrapped around her hair and another around her body.  Amélie glanced at the still-snoring Lena, smiled to herself, and left the bedroom and sat at the small table in the main room of her apartment to let her hair dry. 

She spent the next twenty minutes watching the news on the flat-screen television mounted the wall near her table.  The current story just so happened to be coverage of the assassination of a diplomat and the subsequent leak of information concerning his illicit endeavors, which had discredited the ambassador and put a to a complete standstill the peace treaty he and a large group of rebelling Omnics had been drafting.

Amélie let out a sad sigh; not just because Widowmaker had done her job well, but also because thoughts of Talon were apparently going to plague her this morning.  She had known that Talon was a terrorist organization; that they hurt innocent people and that what they did was wrong – she just hadn’t cared as Widowmaker.  They had given her missions, and the reward for a successful kill was more than enough to maintain her loyalty.  But now… now Amélie was regaining herself; who she had been before the programming.  She knew the programming still lurked in her head, but for some reason or another, it had stopped functioning properly; it came in fits and starts.  And that left one question: was she going to return to Talon?

Of course the obvious answer was no; if they even suspected that something about their precious Widowmaker was off, they’d wipe her mind and take away all of the progress that she had made with Lena.  And Amélie  _refused_  to forget everything that had happened.  Talon had turned her into a murderer; had stripped her of everything and stolen her life from her, but now she had the power to take it back.  She could defect to Overwatch – be with Lena!  It was the only logical choice.

As if her train of thought had set off a warning system, a small, seductive voice made its presence known, whispering from the deepest depths of Amélie’s mind.   _You know you can’t go with your ‘lover,’_  the voice dripped with sarcasm when it said that last word.   _You might be done with Talon, but Talon isn’t done with_ you _.  What Lena can give you, Talon can give you ten-fold.  The pleasure you felt with her in between your legs; Talon can make you have the best orgasm of your life as a reward for a successful mission._

Amélie couldn’t help but blush when the voice mentioned Lena being between her legs, but she shook her head and tried to silence the voice, knowing that it was just the programming trying to convince her to stay with Talon.  Despite her best efforts to push it back, the voice continued, _you don’t need her; you don’t need Overwatch.  Stay with Talon, where you belong.  Do you really think that they’ll just forgive you for your crimes?  For killing Gérard, their own_ agent _?  They’ll never take you back._ Talon _is your home now._

Then the voice and the mild headache it brought with it receded, allowing her to think clearly again. She wondered if all agents had a voice implanted in their mind in order to maintain Talon's control, or if it had been something specifically engineered for Widowmaker.

As with everything else before the apparent malfunctioning had begun, she just hadn't cared enough to give it any thought. But now... now everything was clearer. She felt a lightness that hadn't been there before.

And with that thought, Amélie stood up.  She needed to go; take some time to think about her immediate future and the routes open to her.  And so she went back into her bedroom and quietly got dressed, first slipping on a bra and underwear, then she put on a faded purple t-shirt and a pair of blue-jeans.  She tugged on some plain white socks, then went to her closet and pulled out a pair of black knee-boots and tugged them on, as well. 

She walked back over to her bed and sat on the edge, then gently shook Lena, who at first didn’t respond and continued to let loose small snoring sounds.  After some not-so-gentle shakes, Lena didn’t open her eyes, but groggily slurred into the pillow, “Gimme fve mur minuz, mum” while lifting one arm then letting it unceremoniously fall back onto the bed.

Amélie chuckled lightly then whispered, “You could sleep through the building collapsing, couldn’t you,  _chérie_?”

A light affirmative grunt was her response.

Amélie chuckled again, then continued, “I just wanted to let you know that I’m going to the clothes store to get you some outfits to wear.”  She added coyly, “we can’t go on a date if you’re naked, although I’m sure we could think of some other activities to engage in,  _ma beauté_.”

Hearing that, Lena finally rolled over onto her back to respond.  Her cheeks were flushed a soft red and she spoke much more clearly than just a few seconds before as she said in a small voice, “no, I guess I do need clothes for our…” she blushed even more furiously as she said the last word, “…date.”

Amélie smiled a warm smile at Lena, then leaned down to kiss her.  She loved the way Lena’s lips tasted, and a part of her wanted to maintain that soft, pleasurable contact forever, but she had a task to perform.  So after a couple more seconds, she broke away for breath and whispered, “I’ll be back soon,  _ma chérie_.”

Lena gave her a small smile and whispered, “thanks, luv.  Don’t be too long, though.”  She sounded truly worried that something would happen during Amélie’s foray into the local outlet store.

“I promise, I won’t be too long.  See you in an hour or so.”  And with that, Amélie stood from the bed and grabbed her phone and watch from inside her nightstand.  Then she remembered her silent promise and said, “By the way Lena, we’re in one of my apartments.  We’re outside of Hollywood, in the United States.”

Lena responded with a simple ‘Oh’ as if she didn’t quite know how to respond to the information.  Amélie couldn’t really blame her, it was a reasonable response to finding out that you’d been knocked out and moved to a different continent.  It wasn’t as bad as it sounded, though; it would only take a couple of hours on a flying vehicle to get back to the Overwatch base in Gibraltar.

Amélie still felt guilty about how she had gotten Lena to her apartment, and she suddenly felt the urge to retreat.  So she said, “We can talk about everything when I get back,” then she left the bedroom and walked to her front door.  She pulled a non-descript black hoodie from the row of hooks on the wall and slipped it on, zipping it to about three-quarters of the way up.  The final part of her outfit slipped into place after she tapped a few keys of the holographic interface of her wristwatch: her skin went from an icy blue to a not-quite-pale white.  The altercation with Lena and Winston in the museum months before had resulted in both her and Reaper’s images becoming household.  For security and privacy purposes, Widowmaker had requisitioned from Talon an easily applied disguise for her skin color for use when she had to go undercover or be in public for one reason or another. 

She wondered if this was really her skin tone from before Talon had abducted her, or if it was just their pale imitation – no pun intended – of what she could have looked like.  Again, she was struck by thoughts of what Talon had done to her and, shaking her head, she grabbed her car keys and left her apartment, closing the door quietly behind her and locking it. 

She walked down the hallway to the building’s stairwell; she preferred walking over taking the elevator, since it was healthier and gave her more time to think.  It was as she began her descent to the ground floor that she let her mind wander to Talon, her future with Lena, and what the little voice at the back of her mind had propositioned her with.


	8. A Date Gone Wrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Why can't we just have nice things? Oh right, because TALON.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this is by far the most action-packed chapter of the story. I hope you guys like it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

_Currently, the Apartment Bedroom_

Lena heard the door to the apartment close, signaling Amélie’s departure.  She then interlaced her fingers behind her head on the pillow, and took a moment to reflect.

In the space of what felt like no time, Lena had gone from believing Amélie was gone forever to helping her through a mental breakthrough and making love to her in her Hollywood apartment.

 _I guess this brings a whole new meaning to ‘strange bedfellows,’ eh?_ she chuckled to herself.

 _And today, I’ve got a_ date _with her, of all things._   Lena sat up on the bed, thinking.  Then she said, “Should probably take a shower.”

And so she did.  By the time she had left the bathroom, clean and wrapped in a soft towel, she stood in the bedroom that she had been in for three days – albeit unconscious for two of them.

She looked around, and for the briefest of moments contemplated snooping around the small apartment to see what she could find.  Then she realized that was probably a terrible idea because A) she would lose Amélie’s trust if she walked in on Lena digging through her belongings and that B) Widowmaker probably booby-trapped things that weren’t to be touched by anyone but herself.

 _And a venom mine to the face is NOT high on my to-do list._  

Just then, her stomach growled embarrassingly loudly, reminding her that it had also been three days since she had least eaten.  She was pretty thirsty, too.  So she wandered into the main living area of the apartment, searching for a source of sustenance.  There was a bag of French rolls on the counter of the kitchen area, next to a refrigerator.

 _I’m sure she’ll understand_ , Lena nonchalantly thought to herself as she undid the twist-tie on the bag and slipped out a couple of the rolls. 

Then she swung by the fridge and grabbed a water bottle, then plopped down on the couch and turned on the television, making noises of pure bliss as she munched on the bread and drank the delicious water. 

After she had finished eating, she actually turned her attention to what was on the TV.  It just so happened to be the _This Moment in Crime_ segment on the news channel, which was detailing those two Junker criminals yet again.  The same segment on the two Australians had run every day for months since they had begun their worldwide crime-spree.

She rolled her eyes at the ridiculous reward money offered at the end of the segment; they almost never actually paid that amount, and when they did, there were so many taxes taken out of it that it was dwindled to maybe a third of what was originally offered.

She flicked through the available channels, but as always, there was nothing interesting on.  Forty minutes felt like forever, but exactly that amount of time later, Lena’s ears perked up at the sound of a scanner reading positive and then as the front door swung open.

Lena hopped up off of the couch to greet Amélie, but as soon as she saw the woman enter with a few bags in each hand, her eyes nearly bugged out of her head as she pointed and stammered out, “A-Amélie!  You- your…your…”

Amélie cocked her head to the side in confusion. 

“What?  What is it?”

She started quickly looking herself over, then around her, then looked back to Lena in confusion.

Lena finally managed to get her wits about her and said, “Your skin… it’s not _BLUE!_ ”

It took Amélie a moment to understand what Lena meant, then in realization, she laughed as she shut the door behind her.  She carefully placed the bags she had been carrying onto the floor, then she lifted up her left hand and gestured to the watch on it with her right; “This watch projects a small field that bends the light around my skin to make it appear a normal shade.” 

She held up four fingers and counted off as she said, “Since our little escapade in that museum, authorities have been on the lookout for ‘an armored gorilla; a woman in orange spandex with a searchlight on her chest; a man in a black robe and skull mask; and a blue woman in purple.’”

Then she clicked through a few holographic screens on the watch and the field deactivated, returning her to her normal blue pallor.

Lena was still shocked; it had been like seeing a ghost.  The woman she had been so infatuated with all of those years ago, so vibrant and full of life.  Lena felt guilty, but a part of her wanted Amélie to turn the disguise back on – to turn it on and keep it on forever.  But that would have been wrong.  The blue skin was a part of Amélie now – for the time being at least – and it would be wrong of Lena to try and get her to bury that part of herself.

She shook herself from her thoughts, then helped Amélie pick the bags back up and take them into the living room.

The Frenchwoman smiled at her warmly and said, “I’m sure the sizes are correct; I just hope you like what I picked out, _chérie_.”

Slipping back into her bubbly persona, the Brit giggled and replied, “Thanks, luv; it’s like Christmas!”  Then she sat back down on the couch and started rummaging through the bags as Amélie sat down on the other side of the small couch, watching her expectantly.

Lena first pulled out a bra and underwear, then stood and turned away from Amélie.  She looked back at her over her shoulder with a suggestive look, then shrugged the towel loose, letting it slide down the length of her body and pile up around her feet on the floor.  She winked, and Amélie couldn’t help but laugh a little at Lena’s ridiculous antics.  Then Amélie blushed when Lena bent forward to pull the underwear on, purposely drawing attention to the view of her butt and nether regions, giving them a little shake.  When she had pulled the bra on underneath the stripped down accelerator, she finally turned to the bags and cheerily said, “Now, let’s see what else Santa brought li’l ol’ Lena.”

She took inventory on what was in each bag; three shirts, three different types of pants, some socks covered in little Union Jacks, a pair of dark blue chucks, and a dark brown jacket not dissimilar to her RAF one.

Seeing the jacket, Lena looked up and met Amélie’s eyes and said, “Aw, I love it!” which made Amélie’s smile grow even wider and brought a slight blush to both women’s cheeks. 

When it was all said and done, Lena ended up wearing a black shirt with a picture of the Tardis on it (which fit perfectly over her accelerator), a pair of jeans, the socks and chucks, and the jacket.

When she was fully dressed, Lena looked at herself in a full-length body mirror and smiled, happy with her appearance.  Then she turned to Amélie and gestured to herself, looking for the other woman’s opinion.

Amélie leaned an elbow in the palm of one of her hands and rested the other against her chin in thought.  With a cocked eyebrow, she shrugged and said with faux-nonchalance, “It will do.”

Lena rolled her eyes, then asked, “So, where’re we gonna go?  Have anything in mind?”

Amélie sat in thoughtful silence for a few moments, then snapped her fingers as she said, “I have an idea.”

 

_An hour later, local park_

 

They had ended up going to a small pizza joint and gotten a slice each to go; Amélie had opted for a slice of plain and Lena had gone with the meat supreme, the toppings of which included pieces of bacon, sausage, and pepperoni. 

Seeing Lena’s order, Amélie had given her signature eye roll and the Brit had said, “What?  I’m _famished_ , luv!”

Amélie had looked away, the strange feeling of guilt pressing on her newfound conscience, and then said, “I wanted to apologize again for kidnapping you.  I… regret that I resorted to that.  _Je suis désolé_ _, chérie_.

But,” she had continued in a lighter tone, “I think we both can agree that we are in a very desirable situation, no?”

Lena had blushed, then they both had leaned in for quick peck on the lips.  She positively beamed at Amélie and said, “It’s all right; I forgive ya, luv.  Plus, I think ya made it up to me in full this morning,” she said with a wink.

They had then walked to the nearby park and, after making their way to a bench a little way away from the main concentration of park-goers, had sat down and eaten their lunch.

After she had finished eating her slice (in about 45 seconds), Lena couldn’t suppress a small burp of content and said, “That was delicious, luv!  How’d ya know about that little joint, anyway?”

Amélie swallowed another small bite of her pizza (she was only half-way through), then wiped her mouth with a napkin as she replied, “I had visited Hollywood before, when I was…” she trailed off as she closed her eyes and searched for what age she had been when she had had a family vacation here with her… parents.  The memory floated there, but it was blurred as if it were behind a steam-covered window. 

Lena leaned in and gently placed a hand on her shoulder, then said, “It’s all right, it’ll come to ya.” 

Amélie opened her eyes and said, “I know, I know.  I just _haine_ not being to remember everything.” 

Lena looked off to the side, then back to Amélie and said, “Ya know, we used to do this a lot, you and me.”

Amélie cocked her head to the side in surprise and asked, “We used to do this?”

Lena smiled fondly at the good memories.  “Yeah, back before… y’know.  Back at the Overwatch base in Annecy, we would go out at least once a week and go to a little café, then we’d take a little walk around a park.”

Amélie thought she could see in her mind’s eye fleeting images of some of those times they had spent together.  She remembered vague feelings of happiness at being able to be with her close friend.

She smiled at Lena and said, “That makes me feel happy.”

Lena smiled back and wistfully said (more so to herself than Amélie), “Those were the good ol’ days.”

They both sat quietly for a few moments, listening to the chirping of the birds in the trees and the laughter of children that emanated from the small playground near the entrance to the park.

She had always been observant; one had to be in her line of work, but as Widowmaker, Amélie had never taken the time to simply take in her surroundings and enjoy the scenery.  

The sky above them was a beautiful blue and clear of any clouds; the heat from the shining Sun warming Amélie's cool skin.  

The bench that the two women sat on was located on the border between the front of the park and a nicely-sized forested area with several trails designated for hiking.  

A few benches away, an elderly man fed some birds with a handful of seeds.  A young man and woman walked a dog together along the path in front of the women's row of benches – they were probably a couple.  A gardener trimmed one of the park’s plant sculptures of a dinosaur.  A man in a trench coat talked on his phone while he wrote on a notepad at another bench farther away.

She didn't know why, but as Amélie glanced back at Lena, who was contentedly watching the sky, an intense feeling of longing washed over her.  Not longing for Lena's warm embrace, but longing for a life where Talon, Overwatch,  _the rest of the world_ didn't matter; a normal life that she could spend with Lena and where every day could be like today, right now.  Happy.

With a quiet sigh, Amélie remembered what she had wanted to talk to Lena about, and suddenly lost her appetite.  She placed her plate with her half-eaten pizza down onto an empty space on the bench next to her, then said to Lena, “I wanted to talk to you about something serious.”

Lena looked away from a plane flying overhead and back at Amélie and said, “Anything, luv.  Whachya wanna talk about?”

Before answering, Amélie asked herself if this was really the road she wanted to travel upon, and her own voice answered back with a resounding _Yes_.

For a split-second, the Talon programming pushed forward and hissed _NO_ , but it was easier for Amélie to push back and ignore it.

She took a deep breath, then asked, “How do those at Overwatch feel about me, now?  I know I’ve done terrible things; killed a lot of people, but do you think… do you think they would ever be willing to forgive me?”

Lena heard the vulnerability in Amélie’s voice.  She considered the questions, then realized where the trail of questioning was most likely to lead.  She beamed and looked Amélie in the eye as she replied, “Everyone missed- misses you, Amélie.  If you were to explain to Winston, Angela, and all the rest what happened, and that you’ve broken free from what Talon did to you, then I’m sure they’d forgive you.  They’d have to!”

Hearing Lena’s firm belief that Amélie could rejoin the family she had lost all those years ago, she couldn’t help but feel some wetness develop at the corners of her eyes.  She sniffled, and Lena reached forward and gently brushed away a lone tear that had begun its descent down Amélie’s face.

Amélie pulled her into a tight hug, then kissed her cheek and kissed her again deeply on the lips.

Then she pulled back slightly and looked at her lover as she said, “Lena, I want to defect to Over-” she stopped.

It was like a flip had been switched.

The old man feeding the birds slowly stood up and began walking in their direction, just as the man in the trench coat put down his pen and notepad and continued to talk on his phone as he stood up and began walking in their direction, and the couple with the dog had begun to make a beeline towards them as well.

If Amélie had at all been on the fence about leaving Talon behind, this sealed the deal.  She would _not_ let them take her back for reconditioning.  She also wouldn’t allow Talon to do to Lena what they had done to Amélie.

_Merci, Talon.  You just made it a lot easier for moi._

She pulled Lena into another tight embrace, then whispered in her ear, “When I say run, _run_.”

Lena whispered back, “What?  What’s happening?”

“Discreetly look around; the old man, the couple, the man in the trench coat.”

Lena’s eyes widened as she quickly glanced around them.

“They’re gettin’ awfully close…”

Amélie silently counted down from three, then said in a perfectly level voice, “Run.”

They broke the embrace and jumped over the back of the bench as the nearest Talon agent pulled a sawed-off shotgun out from the inside of his trench coat and fired in their direction.

The shot rang out like a crack of thunder, and screams erupted from the other denizens in the park as they began to run in the opposite direction of the sound.

Lena and Amélie ran into the thick cover of the forested area with the Talon agents in hot pursuit.

The man walking the dog yelled a command to it and its head split both vertically and horizontally down the middle in a vicious snarl, exposing multiple rows of teeth; it was a genetically modified breed that Talon favored for tracking down and capturing targets on the run.  The woman began yelling into her wrist communicator as she pulled out a compact pistol and followed the man with the dog into the forest.

The elderly man had stopped walking.  Lines suddenly appeared crisscrossing his skin as it lifted up in plates and retracted into what turned out to be a metal chassis.  Eyes glowed a menacing red as the assassin drone extended to about seven-and-a-half feet tall, and pulled out a retracted sniper rifle that had been in a slot on its back.  Then it charged into the forest as well.

The gardener that had been working on the sculpture…continued to work on the sculpture as he whistled in tune with some new electronic music by the artist Lúcio Correia dos Santos that he was listening to on his headphones, completely oblivious to what was going on around him.

 

As they ran through the forest in random directions and tried to lose the agents, Amélie pulled two pistols from inside of her hoodie and threw one to Lena.  Then she yelled, “Call your friends at Overwatch; see if we can get extraction!”

Lena wasn't even mildly surprised that she had hidden pistols in her hoodie.

After they had run for a good distance, they slid to a halt behind a nearby boulder, Amélie listening for the sounds of those in pursuit.

Lena pulled her earbuds out of her pocket and had to untangle them, frantically muttering “Bloody hell, bloody _hell_ ,” to herself as she did so.  After four seconds she finally had them untangled and plugged into her accelerator.  She dialed into the proper channel and whisper-screamed, “Winston!  Winston are you there?!”

A second later he answered, “Lena, what is it?  What’s wrong this time?!”

She took a second to search for the easiest explanation, then settled on, “Long story, but I’m in Hollywood with Amélie and we need extraction because Talon has agents trying to either kill or capture us!”

 

While Lena was talking to Winston, Amélie had accessed her assassin programming in order to deal with the threats.  She heard the barking of a dog and yelling, and she popped out of cover to take a few shots at the “couple” with the Talon dog.  The man and dog both collapsed, but the woman dove into cover and fired off a few wild shots of her own.

Part of Amélie felt bad about shooting the dog, but its fate would have been far worse once it had gotten too old to serve Talon’s purposes.  They typically fed older dogs to the younger ones in order to ‘get the maximum use out of them.’  It was disgusting.

 

Winston’s reply to Lena was an urgent, “Okay, I have an agent locked in on your location and he’s on the way.  You need to make it to the nearest road ASAP.  It should be half a mile north of your location.”

Lena quickly replied, “Thanks, big guy!  I’ll explain everything to you as soon as we’re safe!”

In a voice thick with worry, he said, “You’d better.  Get out safe.”  Then the connection was cut.

Lena quickly tore out her earbuds and stuffed them back into her pocket as she repeated the directions to Amélie, who slid back into cover to reload after ending the life of the woman with the communicator with a shot to her throat.

Then, shotgun rounds ricocheted off of the boulder and the ground on either side of it, throwing up sparks as well as mud and dirt.  As soon as the shots stopped – probably so that the trench coat guy could reload – Lena popped up out of cover and waited, holding the pistol with both hands and aiming it in the general direction of where the buckshot had come from.  When the man stepped out from behind a tree, Lena fired.  The man stumbled backwards, his body rather than his mind reacting and making his dying fingers uselessly squeeze off a blast that went wide as he collapsed in a heap.

She looked down at the still-crouched Amélie and said, “Got him!”

Amélie slowly poked her head out of cover to make sure that they were clear, then grabbed Lena’s free hand and yelled, “GO!”

They ran in the direction of the road.  They had run for four straight minutes through more trees and brush when there was a sudden crack of what sounded like a thousand rolls of thunder and a thick tree not five feet to the right of the women exploded at the middle, snapping in half and collapsing.

Amélie took a moment to look back at where the shot had come from.  Her stomach nearly dropped out of her body when she saw the telltale gleaming silver chassis and the bright red photoreceptors inlaid into a familiar skull-shaped head; Talon had sent one of their few elite assassin drones.  Their programming was based on data taken from Widowmaker’s best kills – in essence, they were meant to be able to pull off feats almost as impressive as those of Widowmaker herself.  It was Talon’s last resort if the other agents weren’t able to recapture Amélie or get their hands on Lena.

 _Merde_ , Amélie cursed to herself as she pulled Lena behind another, thicker tree and said, “They sent one of their assassin drones.  We can’t beat this one, trust me.  Their code is based on Widowmaker.”

Lena’s eyes widened at the implications and she asked, “What can we do?”

Amélie reached into her hoodie again and pulled out a small rectangular object.  She gestured to it and said, “This is a smoke bomb.  We can use this for cover, but the smoke won’t last for long.  We’re going to have to run as fast as humanly possible and get to that road before it dissipates.  Are you ready?”

Lena nodded once, eyes still wide.

Amélie nodded back and said, “Okay.  One… two… THREE!”

She flicked a switch on the rectangle and threw it on the ground between them and the approaching assassin drone.  Immediately, smoke began to pour out of the small case and spread out in an enormous haze.

The women ran, pumping their legs in a desperate sprint for their lives.

Unable to see past the smog, the drone ran calculations and approximated where its targets could have run, and began firing explosive rounds from its high-powered sniper rifle.

Tress all around them exploded and collapsed, spraying them with burning bits of leaves, pine needles, and splinters of wood, forcing Amélie and Lena to hop over and jump around the smoking and burning wooded remains. 

After what felt like forever but had in reality been maybe sixty seconds, the trees began to thin out and they could see the road up ahead.

Another tree exploded and collapsed into a burning heap, spurring them on.

Just then, Amélie saw an old, beat-up hovercar model pull up to meet them.  The doors facing them swung open and the driver – _The cowboy!_ she realized – yelled, “ _Get in!_ ”

They dove into the car; Lena in the front passenger’s seat and Amélie in the back.  They both pulled the doors shut, Jesse McCree engaged the locks, and then he sped off, leaving the smoke and burning forest and assassin drone behind.

Amélie and Lena took a few moments to desperately gasp sweet oxygen into their burning lungs, then slumped in their chairs. 

Lena started to chuckle and quickly fell into a laughing fit as the adrenaline and fear drained from her body.

Amélie merely closed her eyes sighed in relief.  _We made it.  Lena’s safe and I’m done with Talon.  Nous allons être tout droit._

After a few more moments of relieved quiet, McCree broke the silence and asked, “So, what brings a pair of beautiful women like you two to Hollywood?”

He mostly directed the question to Lena, who giggled and replied in a conspiratorial tone, “Well, the missus and I were thinkin’ of honeymoonin’ here, so we wanted to check out the sites and see if it was worth the hype.”

Amélie blushed and rolled her eyes at Lena in one of the car’s mirrors, then said from the backseat, “ _Monsieur_ McCree, it is a pleasure to meet you.  I apologize, but I don’t remember if we used to know each other, my name is-”

“-Amélie; I know,” he cut her off.  “I knew Gérard, however you and I were only acquaintances.”  He paused, then added in what might have been a bitter voice, “He was a good man.”

Amélie was silent, a fresh wave of guilt washing over her.  She quietly said, “I know.”

Lena gave McCree a harsh look and whisper-hissed, “Talon brainwashed her – it wasn’t _her_.  She’s breaking free from what they did!”

McCree gave Lena a look of surprise, then thought to himself wryly, _if you say so, darlin’._ Out loud however, he said in a much softer tone of voice, “I’m sorry, that wasn’t right of me.”

Amélie watched as traffic flew by through the window and distantly replied, “ _Non_ , I understand.”

Lena reached back a hand and patted Amélie’s knee, then turned her palm up.  Amélie looked at the slender, calloused hand, then placed one of her own on top and they intertwined their fingers, the warm and intimate contact immediately making Amélie feel somewhat better.

Lena looked back at Amélie and asked, “Should we go back to your apartment to grab your stuff?  Was there anythin’ there that ya wanted to keep?”

Amélie thought for a second, then replied, “ _Non_.  I have what is important: your safety.”

Lena blushed, then gave Amélie’s hand a loving squeeze.

“Plus,” Amélie continued, “Talon is no doubt swarming my place of residence and canvassing the area in the event that I make the _stupide_ decision to return there.  They are just material possessions anyway; I had nothing that mattered.  I also believe that Talon probably has trackers in all of my Widowmaker gear, so I wouldn’t be able to take any of that with _moi_.”

What she had just said rang around in her head a couple of times before she realized how Talon had tracked her down at the park in the first place: _It was the watch_.

She uncoupled her hand from Lena’s in order to deal with the watch, the loss of contact surprising the younger woman. 

Lena worriedly asked, “What’s wrong luv?”

Amélie slipped the watch off of her wrist, then pulled a knife out of her boot as she replied, “I think I know how Talon tracked us down so easily.” 

Then she used the tip of the knife to pry the back of the watch off, then examined the contents.  Almost immediately, she spotted the bug.  She used her thumb and index finger like a pair of forceps and teased the bug out from between two small bundles of wires.  Once it was out, she immediately dropped it on the floor of the car and smashed it underneath her heel.  Then she scooped up the remains and threw them out of the moving car’s window.

“There; all taken care of,” she said, satisfied.  “Even if they were able to track us this far, the trail will go cold and they’ll hit a dead end here.  Given, of course, that we still have some distance to cover before getting where we are going.  _Monsieur_ McCree?”

He hesitated, then replied, “Yeah, we’ve got a little way to go still, so it should be far enough.”

A thought occurred to Lena, then.  “Oi, what’s gonna happen with the Terminator back at the park, huh?  It’s not gonna go on a rampage of carnage, right?”

Amélie replied, “The assassin drone failed its mission, so it will now reenter its incognito mode and return to Talon to file its report.  It will also ‘clean up’ the dead agents so as to leave no evidence of Talon’s involvement.  There will be no robot rampage across Hollywood.”

Bemused, Lena said, “well, that really works out then, don’t it?”    

 

A half-hour later, McCree had driven into an area filled with burned out warehouses and abandoned homes.  It was like a small ghost town on the outskirts of Hollywood.

He slowed to a stop outside of a seemingly random closed-down two-story house, then brought up a holographic display on his cybernetic arm.  He entered a code, and the garage opened.

McCree drove in, then put the car in park as the inconspicuous entrance closed behind them.  There was a loud rumbling of gears, then suddenly they began to slowly descend into the ground.

As if he were used to what was happening, McCree nonchalantly turned to face the two women and said, “By the way, we picked up a couple of new recruits a few weeks ago.  They’re a little off-puttin’, but they’re damn useful – especially if you’re in a tight pinch.”

In a conspiratorial tone, he added, “Y’all might recognize ‘em, too.”

Wondering who they could possibly be, Lena asked, “Who are they?”

The lift came to a stop with a loud _thunk_.

McCree replied with a smirk on his face and a cryptic, “I think their reputation precedes them; you’ll see.”

Then without another word, he turned off the car and popped the locks on their doors.  He jumped out and gestured to a doorway at the back of the hidden base entrance and said, “Follow me, ladies.”

The room that they were in appeared to be an antechamber that led to the actual base.  McCree walked up to a lone door and placed his organic thumb on a scanner and, after a _ding_ and the sound of the door’s internal locking mechanisms unlocking, the door swung open automatically.  The trio, led by McCree, stepped through the doorway and into what appeared to be the common room of the hidden base.

He took off his hat and used it to gesture to their surroundings, “As you can see, this is the main living and dining area,” he said as gestured to the small dining table and home-style kitchen.

“The base isn’t exactly as big or as well-supplied as the other bases used to be, but I guess that’s the cost of reactivatin’ an illegal organization.”

He turned away from them and gestured for them to follow as he cheerfully said, “Follow me and I’ll give ya the grand tour.”

Just then, two people entered the dining/living area from one of the corridors that led out of the room.

Amélie just stared, wondering if this was some disturbing joke.

Lena’s mouth dropped open when she saw who they were.  Then she looked to McCree and, voice full of disturbed incredulity, asked, “You…you can’t be _serious_?!  These two?!”

One of the two, a tall man with a prosthetic right arm and right leg and who smelled of smoke (not like smoke from a cigarette, more like smoke from an explosion or a thousand – he was covered in soot, after all), stood a little bit straighter and said indignantly, with a noticeable Australian drawl, “Well, hello to you, _too_!  Roadie, I can’t believe the nerve of some people, eh?”

The even bigger giant of a man next to him, who appeared to be morbidly obese with a disturbing pig and fire tattoo that covered most of his stomach and a porcine gasmask on his face, merely grunted at his smaller companion.  He then looked to the new arrivals and rumbled out a simple, “ _Hi_ ,” accompanied by a wave of one of his enormous hands.

McCree stepped forward and turned to face the women.  He gestured outwards with the hand still holding his hat, encompassing the other men and the base as a whole, and with a humorous wink and jovial tone in his voice said, “Ladies, welcome to _Casa de_ Overwatch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And "Season 1" of my Widowtracer fic comes to an end. I will probably start writing "Season 2" soon, so don't fret! I hope you all enjoyed the story so far, and as always, comments and kudos are appreciated. Thanks! :D


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